Thursday, January 06, 2011

Crisis! Bedbugs At Waldorf Astoria since 2007!

Guess who brought them there. I'll give you a hint; they usually can be found changing sheets and cleaning bathrooms, and English isn't their first language.

Bedbugs A Frequent Guest at Ritzy Hotel.

Here in New York, we're beginning to see the confluence of two issues; illegal immigration, and the "Ick! Factor" of the Upper Crust. The Illegals are needed because no one changes hotel sheets, washes dishes, watches your children or manicures a lawn like a Central American, or works cheaper (it's amazing how cheap fabulously wealthy people can be, but then again, it squares nicely with the liberal desire to have "The Government" pay for everything), but, how do you square the need for cheap domestic help with the possible mortification of a guest in your hotel or swanky home that may be Catching Cooties from Consuela, and not by the old-fashioned, horizontal method, either?

Well, the first thing to do is to fire Consuela, of course, and then find another ethnic group to exploit. Expect to see Chinese and Caribbean domestics in vogue, soon, along with the bromide that they're "cleaner". After that, expect a load ofnews stories about the difficulties of the Rich will have in fumigating the house, furniture and limousine.

In the last two years or so, stories about bedbugs in New York City public schools, in the hospitals, and many other public places, have become common. No one in a position of authority had much to say about it because doing so would bring attention to the illegal immigration problem, and more specifically, paint illegal immigrants as filthy, unsanitary, disease-and-vermin-carrying wretches who would be targets for public approbation (you should see the ones around here; constantly coughing, spitting, and peeing in the streets. You'd wonder how it is that such outmoded notions continue to persist...?).

Heaven forbid people should be allowed to tell the truth about anything because it might offend someone else, especially the person the truth is being told about.

And then someone found bedbugs in Bloomingdales!

And now there's bedbugs in the Waldorf!

Even the Beautiful People began to sit up and take notice at that point, and Emperor Doomberg is said to be taking the issue "very seriously". Before it was simply something limited to the Commoners; that rabble that attends the public schools, the hired hands, the hourly Wage-Earner. Now it's moved into their circles of the better-bred, and they're demanding protection from these pernicious little pests that they helped bring back because they needed Pedro and Marisol to clean the six bathrooms in the Penthouse, off-the-books and sans Social Security taxes.

Soon, some of the swankiest stores in Manhattan will be putting up signs that say "Bed Bug Free", and right now, enterprising entrepreneurs are performing Bedbug Inspections all over Gramercy Park, and getting $1,000 a pop for them.

Because nothing is a crisis until it begins to affect those with money and a politician's ear, you see, and then it becomes a tsunami of overreaction, in which the first part of the hasty "solution" is to throw money at the problem. But, I wouldn't be surprised if we're not looking at the start of a (minor) crackdown on illegals in New York City, because of this new public health issue and potential source of personal embarrassment for the Upper-Crust. I won't hold my breath, though.

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